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Get your associate or bachelor’s degree here on the Liberty University campus. Choose from more than 200 undergraduate residential programs in a wide variety of fields. You can also tailor your degree and target your area of interest through our specialized minors and certificates.

Get a world-class education with the solid Christian foundation you’re looking for at Liberty University. Here, you’ll gain the values, knowledge, and skills you’ll need for success in every aspect of life.

Tickets & Merchandise

Get your associate or bachelor’s degree here on the Liberty University campus. Choose from more than 200 undergraduate residential programs in a wide variety of fields. You can also tailor your degree and target your area of interest through our specialized minors and certificates.

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Graduate Comprehensive Examination

Purpose

The purpose of the comprehensive examination is to allow students to demonstrate their substantive and integrative knowledge of the field of Sport Management. The exam will stimulate reflection on students’ previous studies thereby eliciting the broad and comprehensive knowledge and understanding required in transitioning to either the internship experience or thesis research.

In this sense, the comprehensive examination is meant to be a “bridge” between the concepts, theories, and practices presented in various coursework and the critical analysis demanded by thesis research or knowledge transfer that is essential for an efficacious internship experience.

Enrollment

Students are expected to undertake the comprehensive examination once the seven core courses in the Master's program (21 hours) are complete. To officially begin the comprehensive examination the student must request enrollment in the exam by means of email to the Graduate Secretary for the Department of Sport Management. Students who are inadvertently enrolled in SMGT 689 or 699 without having passed the comprehensive examination will be dismissed from the course until the comprehensive exam is successfully completed.

Examination Procedures

The comprehensive examination is comprised of seven sections, each representing one of the seven core courses, and is presented in the Blackboard environment. The entire examination contains 100 multiple choice or true/false questions worth one point each and students have a maximum of two hours to complete each individual section.

The student must receive a passing grade of at least 80% to be successful. Students who successfully complete the comprehensive examination can subsequently email the Director of Graduate Studies for enrollment into SMGT 689 or SMGT 699.

If the initial attempt results in a failing grade, the student will have a second chance to retake the entire examination and earn a passing grade. If the student receives a failing grade on the second attempt, the student will be given the opportunity to retake the section(s) of the exam in which they failed, but are not required to retake the areas in which they passed. If this attempt results in a failing grade in any individual section, the student will be required to retake the respective core course(s) in the area in which they failed. After completing the core course(s), the student will then be given a final attempt to retake the section of the exam associated with the repeated course. If this attempt results in failure, the student will be dismissed from the graduate program.

Technical Difficulties

If you should be locked out of any portion of the exam, please email the Graduate Secretary for the Department of Sport Management and request that portion to be reset.

Answers to Frequently Asked Questions

These policies and procedures have been in effect since the Fall, 2011 semester.

• Students are required to complete the comprehensive exam in order to graduate. This requirement will not be waived for any student.

• Students are expected to undertake the comprehensive examination once the seven core courses (500 level) in the Master’s program (21 hours) are completed.

• Students are strongly advised to keep their textbooks for all 500 level courses. The exam is open-book. Students who do not keep their textbooks are strongly advised to repurchase their books for completion of their exam. The department does not have textbooks for lending.

• Students who are inadvertently enrolled in SMGT 689 or SMGT 699 without having passed the comprehensive examination will be dismissed from the course until the comprehensive exam is successfully completed. Once completed the student can request to be re-enrolled in the course.

• The comprehensive exam requirement will not be waived for any student.

• Students are advised to enroll in the Comprehensive Exam as soon as possible after the completion of their 500 level courses. Students are advised to give themselves ample time to pass the exam before they need to enroll in their culminating experience course (do not wait until the last week or days before the course enrollment deadline for the sub term).

• No course requirements override will be given for the comprehensive exam to meet deadlines for course enrollment.

• The exam consists of 100, true/false and/or multiple choice questions and is taken online through Blackboard. The exam is divided into seven sections with each section corresponding to each of the seven core courses in the program. Students are given two hours to complete each section of the exam and are encouraged to utilize the entire allotted time. The sections do not have to be taken in one sitting, but can be taken over the course of several days. The exam is open-book. Each section of the exam is labeled as to which course it corresponds to.